A Moment of Downtime
by Rhys
Summary: After the events of X-Wing: Mercy Kill, Myri Antilles has some time to waste on Coruscant, so she goes to the next-best-place to home...


_I apologize if anyone came here expecting a point to this story. There isn't one. Good news is, there's very little in the way of spoiler-information regarding _Mercy Kill_. Bad news is, there's very little in the way of anything else, either. Basically, this story exists because I really, really, really want Celchu-babies to exist in canon. And they don't, yet. So at three o'clock in the morning, immediately upon finishing the book, I pulled the computer out and created this. As such, it has all the hallmarks of a three-in-the-morning fic written in post really-good-book-haze: chiefly, no plot. Oh well._

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**A Moment of Downtime**

"You're making that up!"

"Nope." Myri grinned. "He was dancing."

The boy next to her shook his head. His white-blonde, shoulder-length hair flared out around his face in a feathery cloud. "I don't believe you."

"Bail!" Myri clapped a hand to her breast, and mustered her very best shocked-and-hurt expression. "Would I lie to you?"

"Yes," the boy replied immediately, his pale head bobbing. "You just wouldn't be able to fool me if you tried—so I guess I have to believe you." He flopped backwards onto the bed and idly swiped his blue eyes free of their sudden curtain of hair. "I wish I'd seen that," he said plaintively.

Myri ruffled the hair back into his face. "Don't whine," she said, her scold soothing. "In a few years, you'll be running scams and missions that'll make what the definitely-not-re-formed-Wraiths do look like kids' games."

Little Bail Celchu blew out his breath in an irritated huff. "I don't see why I can't do all that _now_," he complained. "I'm already better than half the operatives running," he said matter-of-factly. "I hacked mom's systems and took all the Intelligence Application tests. I _aced _them."

"Well of course you did," Myri said fondly, rolling her eyes. "You were practically _bred _to, after all."

Bail stuck his tongue out at her. "Was not," he said. "I'm half pilot, you know."

"Which only makes you more dangerous," Myri said, "just like me."

They grinned at each other. Bail spread the fingers of his right hand open in "attack formation"—two fingers up, and two down, forming the X-shaped S-foils around the cockpit thumb—and Myri immediately copied the gesture. They put their two X-hands into dives, brushing past each other's arms like hotshot pilots playing chicken with their ships.

Myri Antilles and Bail Celchu had practically grown up together, and Bail was the little brother that Myri had never realized she didn't actually have. He was twelve years younger than Myri, and itching to follow his mostly older not-actually-siblings-but-close-enough into the exciting field of grown-up activities. Of course, most of the children of the Rogues and Wraiths (and other assorted fighter squadrons and combat units) tended to feel that way: having grown up on the stories of their parents' heroic adventures, the next generation had always been keen on heading out to make their own, some of them a lot earlier than was strictly permitted.

"I don't feel dangerous," Bail complained. "Dad wouldn't even let me come along as an observer for your extraction on Vandor-3."

Myri frowned. "You're not supposed to know about that," she observed, unsurprised.

Bail smirked at her. He looked a lot like his father when he did that, although Tycho tended to aim for long-suffering, heavily-disguised sarcasm. Bail was an impish little devil, quietly polite in the most neutral, forgettable sort of way; until he decided to turn on the charm, and then his smiles were like a thermal detonator: always overkill, but irresistibly unstoppable.

Myri blamed it on the Corellian influences he had been so rashly subjected to in childhood.

"So since you already know everything I was doing, tell me what you've been up to, then," Myri said. "Aside from slicing your way into your parents' private files and rifling through their military and government resources, of course. You know, _new _stuff."

Bail's pale cheeks flushed pink. "Well," he said slowly, "I did sort of...meet a boy..."

"Oooh." Myri rolled over onto her stomach and grinned at the shy boy blushing next to her. "Tell me all about him," she said, in her best big-sister-gossip-voice.

"His name is Joryce, we went to school together for a while, he works part time at the Archives—"

"Hang on," Myri interrupted, "is this the green Twi'lek boy? The pretty one with the swirly tattoos on his lekku?"

Bail blushed harder, and nodded.

Myri fluttered her eyelashes. "Oooh," she said again. "So what's going on there, then?"

"...I kissed him," Bail admitted.

Myri's jaw dropped at the idea of her shy little almost-a-brother getting up the guts to kiss anyone, let alone such a bright and outgoing fellow as that Twi'lek student. "Did you really?" she said, impressed.

Bail nodded. "Mom was pretty mad when she found out, though," he added.

"Why?" Myri frowned. Her Aunt Winter was a very dignified, respected woman, keen on proper etiquette, good manners, and well-maintained weaponry. She was also big on people being responsible for their own actions, and making well-reasoned choices based on their own personal creeds and duties, and sticking to their convictions. Myri couldn't think why Winter would object to one of her sons testing the waters of romance.

Bail mumbled something unintelligible.

"Sorry," Myri smirked, "I didn't quite catch that."

"I said, I hadn't done a background check on him yet."

Myri managed to turn her snort into a cough. "Bail Gial Celchu," she said, "are you telling me that you kissed a boy before you ran a comprehensive security investigation on him?" Myri shook her head, struggling to maintain her stern expression. "I am deeply ashamed of you," she scolded.

Bail stuck his tongue out. "I've heard stories about the _Errant Venture_," he retorted. "I'll bet you've kissed _lots _of boys without running _any _sort of background check on them."

"Yes," Myri agreed gravely, "but I am a Corellian. We are _supposed_ to do stupid things like that."

"So we can blame your dad for any bad decision-making skills we evince?"

Myri and Bail both craned their necks around to look at the new speaker: a slim girl leaning against the doorframe of Bail's room. She was practically a mirror image of the boy, her aristocratic face just a shade more delicate and her white-blonde hair shorter than her brother's stylish mop. Hers was cropped close with military precision, the mark of a Starfighter trainee.

Myri gasped. "Bree, don't tell me you've started your training!" she cried.

"Not quite officially," the girl admitted. "But I sliced some records so I could get into the sims, and when mom found out, she was impressed enough that she let me carry on. I'm going to do the same thing your sister did, and fly under a fake name for a little, so that people don't just treat me like General Celchu's kid." Breha shrugged. "It seemed the most sensible course of action. Frankly," she added drily, "I'm surprised your sister thought of it."

Myri grinned. "Always surprising when Syal shows any evidence of sense," she agreed. "Now, why are you blaming my dad?" she asked. "There are _tons _of Corellians and other assorted bad influences you could hold accountable, not just him."

Breha Ibtisam Celchu trotted into the room, her posture just a hair off of pure military precision. "Blaming Uncle Han would be silly," she explained, hopping up onto her brother's bed. Bail obligingly scooted over to give his sister room to sit.

"Yeah," he agreed, "no one would buy that, because we spent our whole lives being told never to do _anything _that Uncle Han does."

Myri laughed. "A sensible piece of advice," she said. "If only my parents had been as clever..."

"Ah," Breha said, "but you were doomed from the start. You _are _Corellian. You never had a chance."

The Celchus shook their pale heads, their nearly-identical faces mournful. The serious, sorrowful expressions made them look eerily like their parents.

Myri shoved Breha over sideways and ruffled Bail's hair again. "Floobs," she proclaimed. "Mind-fried floobs, the both of you."

"Careful," Breha said smugly, "we remember everything you say, so when mom asks us where we're learning bad language..."

"You'll say it's from your dad's friends, like always," Myri finished.

The siblings shrugged. "It's true, from a certain point of view," Bail observed sagely. "They're almost always the original source, even when it gets filtered through other people."

Myri grinned. "You know," she said, "whenever I'm away from you guys for any length of time, I always end up forgetting how much trouble you are. It's those thrice-bedamned innocent little faces you pull. I spend too long away, I forget what devils you actually are."

The Celchus gave her identical grins. "We know," Breha said for both of them, Bail nodding along with his sister. "That's the idea."

"Sithspit," said Myri.

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_Thanks to Onimiman for catching my goof!_


End file.
